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Libyans ready to vote

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The congress will appoint a transitional government and draft a new constitution

Among the 3,500 candidates is Awziya Shweigi, who says the revolution gave her hope

The new government will face myriad challenges

Awziya Shweigi came into this world in 1969, the year that Moammar Gadhafi grabbed control of Libya. Now, less than a year after Gadhafi's fall, Shweigi is one of thousands of candidates standing in Saturday's election, Libya's first in almost half a century.

Libyans will go to the polls to elect a 200-seat national assembly that will carry out two important tasks: appoint a transitional government and draft a new constitution.

After four decades of one-man rule, Libyans appear excitedabout the election. More than 3,500 candidates are running, and more than 300 political entities have blossomed.

About 80% of Libya's 3.5 million eligible voters registered to cast a ballot Saturday.

The last time Libya held an election was in 1964, and that one was not very transparent.

Saturday's polling will surely be a litmus test for a post-Gadhafi Libya. Its new leaders will have their work cut out for them as they begin a new, more democratic era.

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Just this week, Amnesty International published a scathing report on lawlessness in Libya that urged Libyan authorities to rein in revolutionary militias accused of a plethora of human rights violations and establish a functioning judiciary.

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On Friday, a Libyan air force helicopter transporting ballot boxes from the eastern city of Benghazi to nearby areas was hit by anti-aircraft fire, Interior Ministry spokesman Col. Ali al-Sheikhi said.

The new government must also figure out how to unify the country as it moves forward. That includes a reconciliation process for those who were Gadhafi loyalists.

And there is the task of rebuilding a nation ravaged by dictatorship and most recently, last year's conflict.

The National Transitional Council, Libya's de facto rulers since Gadhafi was captured and killed in October, inherited a land where few civil institutions existed. The new government will have to create a functioning society out of that vacuum.

Libyans are clamoring for basic services -- at the top of the list is adequate health care. Other problems are easily visible. Heaps of trash litter roads because of the lack of proper disposal services.

Campaign posters and billboards in Libyan cities and towns advertise all the candidates who are running Saturday. Most are unknown to Libyans as is the political process itself. Gadhafi was not one to cultivate political culture.

There are also concerns about security at the polls Saturday.

Calls for more representation in the national assembly and demands for more seats have increased from the east. Protesters in Benghazi, marginalized under Gadhafi and the cradle of the Libyan uprising, tore down election posters last week.

A small but vocal federalist movement in the east announced it will boycott the elections while Gadhafi loyalist towns such as Sirte and Bani Walid may prove troubling.

Still, Libyans have high hopes for the future.

"If Libya's issues are a mosaic, I believe I hold one piece of it," Shweigi said. "It might be a small one, but an effective one that completes it."

A geneticist by trade, she has been working to identify the bodies of those who died in Libya's eight-month uprising. Now, she said she wants to do more.

Frederic Wehrey of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, who has been in Libya ahead of the parliamentary vote, said he was guardedly optimistic about Libya's transition.

"The glaring shortfalls in the transition are the lack of development in the security sector and the continued activity of powerful militias," Wehrey wrote on the think tank's website.

"It's tempting on the surface to see the situation on the ground as chaotic and alarming with armed men roving the streets. But it's not all bad news, in many cases the militias actually maintain a degree of discipline, provide pre-election security, and work with the government to police their own areas -- so things are being kept under control at least for now. The key question is how these militias will react to the election results and the subsequent distribution of power among tribes and towns."

Because polling is virtually nonexistent, it's difficult to predict winners and losers in Saturday's voting, said Isobel Coleman of the Council on Foreign Relations.

"But it is clear that religion and identity politics will play a vital role," she wrote on the council's website.

She, too, expressed optimism but questioned whether women would end up with any significant representation. About 45% of registered voters are women. "Solid, but imperfect progress," Coleman wrote.

"In theory, half of the 80 seats reserved for political parties are supposed to go to women because political party lists are required to contain equal numbers of men and women," she said.

Shweigi said she may not be an expert on defense or the national budget but as a woman, she represents a large part of Libyan society. She is a widow and mother of six and said her experience with family will make her an asset.

She has been campaigning on the streets, fully covered in Islamic dress, talking to women -- and men.

That's a huge change in this Islamic nation, said Samer Muscati of Human Rights Watch.

"Previously we would not have as many pictures of women outside in public spaces, and now that's becoming a normal event at least in Tripoli and some other areas as well," he said.

"So I think this election is changing women's participation not only in politics but also in a larger scale," he said.

Shweigi said she doesn't expect to win Saturday. But she, like so many other Libyans, feels she was born again after Gadhafi was gone. And she wanted to experience the fruits of the revolution.